The fabulous monster files of the fearless Minerva McFearless
The fabulous monster files of the fearless Minerva McFearless (orig. The Monstrous Memoirs of a Mighty McFearless) is a 2006 children's book by the American musician Ahmet Zappa , son of Frank Zappa . The German edition was published by Ravensburger Buchverlag .
Zappa's first book contains drawings by the author and photos by Clay Sparks. He only got into book writing when he was drawing watercolors of monsters for fun and sending them to his friends.
action
11-year-old Minerva (the first-person narrator ) and her younger brother Max live with their father Manfred McFearless in their home on Rockinghorse Lane.
When their father is away, they spend their time in the family library, reading or playing around the house. One evening Max opens a secret door. The siblings find a secret room behind it, which is set up as a laboratory with books, cupboards, weapons and samples from unknown animals.
Minerva touches a mysterious book that bites her on the spot. The father comes over and treats Minerva. She wants to know what the lab and the book are all about. Her father explains to her that he is a professional monster hunter and that the book is about Miss Monstroklopädia. This is a living and talking book that contains all information about monsters and how to fight them. You have to be bitten by it to read it, but its bite is poisonous.
Manfred says that all of the McFearless family hunt monsters to protect humanity from evil. Minerva and Max are forbidden to ever go back into the laboratory or read Miss Monstroklopädia. If Miss Monstroclopedia ever returns to the monsters, terrible things can happen. But Minerva and Max keep sneaking into the laboratory and secretly learn everything about monsters, only to one day continue the family tradition.
One night her house is attacked by terrible monsters. Manfred manages to get his children and Miss Monstroklopädia to safety, but he himself is kidnapped. The next morning, Minerva and Max meet Mr. Devilstone on the mysterious coyote , who uses a walking stick, wears a top hat and an eye patch. He explains to the siblings that their father is in the hands of the Zarmaglorg, the most terrible of all monsters. After initial suspicion, Minerva and Max, together with Miss Monstroklopädia and Mr. Devilstone, go on a dangerous journey to save their father.
Zappa states that with the book he wanted to help children overcome the fear of monsters from which he suffered as a child.
reception
The journalist Ulrike Plewnia praises the book's bizarre humor. With the monster theme it is in trend with the times, but does not come close to models such as the Harry Potter saga. Wieland Freund von der Welt reads the book as an "ironic horror novel" and compares it with the works of Philip Ardagh , but criticizes that the book offers "little more than a heap of well-known motifs". The characters remained faceless, the atmosphere and plot were practically absent, and the “carefully thought-out defense recipes” listed in the book were said to be tasteless and not funny.
continuation
Ahmet Zappa is currently working on the sequel to his book, in which Max McFearless is the first-person narrator.
filming
Before the first copy of the book was published in the USA , Disney and Jerry Bruckheimer Films, the producers of " Pirates of the Caribbean ", had secured the film rights for 1.5 million US dollars.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Ulrike Plewnia: Monstroklopädia & Co, Focus, November 14, 2006, focus.de
- ↑ Ulrike Plewnia: Monstroklopädia & Co, Focus, November 14, 2006, focus.de
- ↑ Wieland friend eggs nightmare with mustard, Die Welt, November 4, 2006 welt.de
- ↑ Ulrike Plewnia: Monstroklopädia & Co, Focus, November 14, 2006, focus.de